Conservative Party candidate Guillermo Roldán Correa and Partido de la U candidate Donay de Jesús Correa Londoño, who were both running for mayor of Campamento, were killed by the FARC after being held for a short time in the the village of La Concha. The two politicians had never previously received any threats and had traveled without bodyguards, according to José Acevedo, the police chief of Antioquia.

The FARC’s 36th Front has a strong presence around Campamento, where in the past they have set up roadblocks, killed and kidnapped people and have also attacked the electricity infrastructure and roads in the area. The guerrillas in the region allegedly earn their income from the drug trade and by extorting local gold miners.

Violence by the FARC has been on the rise in recent weeks, with the group attacking a mayoral candidate for El Bagre in Antioquia and threatening conservative leader Liliana Rendón.

Colombia’s Interior Minister Germán Vargas Lleras took a hardline stance to the communique, saying the government will not consider a humanitarian exchange and that the FARC should release all prisoners without any conditions.

“Nobody is going to build a stage for a political role without concrete facts that demonstrate a real will to release these people, so the government is not prepared to mount a platform that does not lead to anything, ” Vargas said, according to Colombia’s Caracol Radio.

Bolivia said on Tuesday it had taken steps to ensure that Iran’s defense minister, who is accused by Argentina of planning the 1994 bombing of a Jewish community center in Buenos Aires that killed 85 people, leaves Bolivia immediately.